The present Lord Kenyon (the Peer who writes letters,
For which the waste-paper folks much are his debtors)
Hath one little oddity well worth reciting,
Which puzzleth observers even more than his writing.
Whenever Lord Kenyon doth chance to behold
A cold Apple-pie--mind, the pie _must_ be cold--
His Lordship looks solemn (few people know why),
And he makes a low bow to the said apple-pie.
This idolatrous act in so "vital" a Peer,
Is by most serious Protestants thought rather queer--
Pie-worship, they hold, coming under the head
(Vide _Crustium_, chap, iv.) of the Worship of Bread.
Some think 'tis a tribute, as author he owes
For the service that pie-crust hath done to his prose;--
The only good things in his pages, they swear,
Being those that the pastry-cook sometimes put there.
_Others_ say, 'tis a homage, thro' piecrust conveyed,
To our Glorious Deliverer's much-honored shade;
As that Protestant Hero (or Saint, if you please)
Was as fond of cold pie as he was of green pease,[1]
And 'tis solely in loyal remembrance of that,
My Lord Kenyon to apple-pie takes off his hat.
While others account for this kind salutation;"--
By what Tony Lumpkin calls "concatenation;"
A certain good-will that, from sympathy's ties,
'Twixt old _Apple_-women and _Orange_-men lies.
But 'tis needless to add, these are all vague surmises,
For thus, we're assured, the whole matter arises:
Lord Kenyon's respected old father (like many
Respected old fathers) was fond of a penny;
And loved so to save,[2] that--there's not the least question--
His death was brought on by a bad indigestion,
From cold apple-pie-crust his Lordship _would_ stuff in
At breakfast to save the expense of hot muffin.
Hence it is, and hence only, that cold apple-pies
Are beheld by his Heir with such reverent eyes--
Just as honest King Stephen his beaver might doff
To the fishes that carried his kind uncle off--
And while _filial_ piety urges so many on,
'Tis pure _apple_-pie-ety moves my Lord Kenyon.
[1] See the anecdote, which the Duchess of Marlborough relates in her
Memoirs, of this polite hero appropriating to himself one day, at dinner,
a whole dish of green peas--the first of the season--while the poor
Princess Anne, who was then in a longing condition, sat by vainly
entreating with her eyes for a share.
[2] The same prudent propensity characterizes his descendant, who (as is
well known) would not even go to the expense of a diphthong on his
father's monument, but had the inscription spelled, economically,
thus:--"_mors janua vita_"